


Steamstuck

by Luna264



Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Gen, Steampunk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-01
Updated: 2015-07-01
Packaged: 2018-04-07 02:47:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4246521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luna264/pseuds/Luna264
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steampunk, noun; a genre of writing related to science fiction, taking place in a Victorian Era like society, but with futuristic technologies, such as sentient robots, advanced genetic engineering constructs, and other, similar ideas and creations.</p>
<p>Put in some homestuck characters, a bit of alchemy, and throw things at the wall to see what sticks. Oh, yeah, and try to keep a linear progression of events in the style known as "plot".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Steamstuck

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This is me actually trying to keep up a consistent plot, with realistic characters and an advanced story, and hoping I don't get writers block three chapters in and never touch it again or speed through it too quickly and fuck everything up even more than that time on the meteor where Eridan decided that joining Bec Noir was a great idea. As I type this note and prepare to post this first chapter, I already have a bit of the next one written. Problem is, I dunno whether it should go at the beginning or the end! Oh well, I suppose I'll figure it out soonventually-ish. By which I mean, sooner than eventually, but not so soon as to call it soon, and the actual timeframe this event could occur within is rather large.
> 
> Anyways, wish me luck with actually successfully finishing a story of any significant length! I look forward to your feedback!

A young man stood in a workshop, as was often the case. As was also often the case when anything important happened, it was the 13th anniversary of the day his teacher, an inventor, had taken him in as an apprentice and pseudo-son. Nobody knew his birthday, so they just used that instead. As it was, he hadn't _just_ been standing there. He had been working on one of the leg joints of his pseudo-sister's pseudo-dog, Bequeral. The boy's name was John. Nobody knew his last name, just like they didn't know his birthday, or how the inventor had come to find him. But that didn't matter to him; he was happy there. He finished up the joint, put away his tools, and turned on the dog, which emitted some happy sounding recorded barks.  
"Jade!" He called over his shoulder. "Bec's ready!" He smiled at the sound of her hurried feet coming down the stairs. He lifted the dog off the table and turned towards her as she entered. "Here you go." He grunted as he hefted it into her arms. She rubbed her face against the metallic neck before setting her pet down.  
"John, you should have put him in terrier mode. Dad's having a visitor today." She opened the side panel up for the necessary adjustments.  
"Oh! I completely forgot about that! He said I have to get _my_ invention from the barn!" The boy started off, but then turned around again. "Tell him where I am!" He said to his sister and her now terrier-sized companion.  
"Will do." She said. "Now go!" He nodded and ran off  
**John: Retrieve Arms**

"Welcome!" Jade heard her father say the their guest entered. She looked at Bec, contained in her arms.  
"He's early!" She muttered worriedly. "John still isn't back yet!" She snuck to the corner of the hall, listening closely.  
"Thank you for having me, Mr. English. As you know, we have more than just the usual matters to discuss today. But first, where are John and Jade?" The girl peeked around the corner of the hall at her father's guest. He dressed in the garb of a duke, colored in dark red. Behind him was a boy in a slightly lighter shade of the same color. Her father noticed the boy as well.  
"So this is Dave?" He asked curiously. "Seems like a nice kid." The boy looked away and narrowed his eyes in annoyance. Jade's father laughed.  
"Can't seem to get him interested in automations." The duke said, slightly as annoyed as his son. "Anyways, about my previous question?"  
"Right, sorry." Jade watched her father rub the back his head. "John? Jade? Come in here!" Jade walked around the corner without putting Bec down.  
"John's out to the barn to get his invention. He's not back yet." She attempted not to look at their guests. Something about the duke really bothered her, and his son...  
"Alright. I guess you can keep Dave company while we wait for John to get back. His father and I have some talking to do."  
**Jake and Dirk: Abscond to study for business matters**  
The two kids stood in the entrance hall for a while after their fathers left. Then Dave turned to look at Jade. "Do you know?" He asked her, rather monotonously.  
"Know what?" She shot back.  
"They've got an arranged marriage out on us."  
"What?" Her face flushed. "But we've never even met before! Surely Father wouldn't--"  
"Well apparently he did. And now we're stuck with the consequences." They stood in silence for a while.  
"That was a terrible icebreaker."  
"Yeah, well, I realized that too late. Now we're stuck with it." More silence. Then the door opened, admitting John. He looked at the two of them, trying to decide which of them to greet first. "Who's this loser?" Dave asked Jade.  
"That would be my brother, actually." She answered coldly.  
"Oh." Dave said, suddenly awkward. "Well. I didn't--"  
"I'm adopted." John said, adjusting the straps on the mechanical arms he was wearing as he fully entered. Dave was clearly unsettled by what was happening. Bec barked in an attempt to clear the silence.  
"I..." Dave, who had been looking around frantically for some way to change the the subject, zeroed in on the mechanical canine. "I like your dog." He said quickly.  
"I made the dog." John offered helpfully.  
"Great." Dave said nervously. "Hey, who wants to find out what our parents are talking about?"  
"Sure." John and Jade shrugged. The three of them snuck off down the hallway, Jade silently cursing her dress all the way.  
**John, Jade, and Dave: Investigate**

Rose assisted her inebriated mother up the stairs to the master bedroom. She tucked her mother into bed for the third time that afternoon and went back downstairs to keep an eye on her mothers alchemy.  
**Roxy: Sleep off intoxicant**  
Alchemical fires were a daily occurrence which the young girl attempted to keep to a minimum. This had somehow earned her a ban from the lab, but she went in anyways in order to keep the house. And her mother, who somehow made enough money off her alchemical escapades to afford not only a two story house plus alchemic cellar, but and extraordinary amount of fine wine. Rose found the whole thing quite fascinating, if a little disappointing. She was about to open the cellar door when the one covering the entry sounded off.  
"Coming!" The girl called, turning her back on the door she had been about to enter. She walked over to the door and opened it to see one of the messengers of the local noble. In fact, it was one she recognized.  
"James!" She said, a bit surprised by his identity. "What does the duke want now?"  
"He wishes to invite your mother to dinner tonight, along with another important guest. He says it's to honor an old friend."  
"I'll tell her, but I can't offer a definitive reply. She always gets way more drunk than normal on this day of the year, and this year was no exception."  
"Right." There was a bit of a silence. "I'll tell the duke that the answer is 'maybe'."  
"Good choice." The messenger waved as he started off on his way back to the mansion where the duke resided.  
**James: Be an unimportant character**  
Rose closed the entryway and opened the cellar door. She was greeted by the smell of smoke. "Oh, fuck!" She shouted, and ran down the stairs to stop the fire.  
**Rose: Extinguish flames**

Dave led the way to the study, despite not knowing how to get there. At the fork in the hallway, he went the wrong direction for a few paces. When they got to the study, the pressed their ears against the door.  
"--tell them?" They heard the duke say as they got into earshot.  
"I don't know. But we have to. They're smart kids, they'll figure it out eventually."  
"I know. I'm beginning to suspect Dave already has. So, we'll move on from that for now. What was this about John's invention?"  
"Ah, yes. He's a bright boy, so I'm not surprised he managed it. He successfully designed and created a style of robotic arm that can be grafted to the human nervous system. He has two of them on a belt that he uses with a remote and a MiAI. It's quite amazing." The pride in the man's voice was unmistakable. Dave's eyes were wide, but he didn't say anything.  
"With the proper funding, this technology could help thousands." Duke Strider mused. "I don't suppose there's a way to persuade me..."  
"Dirk, I keep telling you, that was years ago. We have-- mph!" The kids looked at each other fearfully. None of them had a clue about what was happening in the room. Dave motioned them down the hallway. When they were far enough away, they all burst into whispers.  
"What's going on in there?"  
"How the hell should I know?"  
"He's your dad!"  
"I didn't know anything about this!"  
"What do we do?"  
"We should help Dad!"  
"Mine or yours?"  
"Ours! Yours is clearly at fault here!"  
"We don't even know what's happening!" The sound of a door opening silenced them, and they hid behind the corner.  
"--Roxy as well, but who knows if she'll be sober enough." They heard the duke say. They held their breaths, hoping to hear more. "Anyway, if John's back, I'd like to see his invention."  
"He's probably off somewhere with Jade and Dave." Jade heard her father say. "Who knows where they went."  
"You mean there isn't a tracker in her dog?"  
"I've been trying to get John to give me the receiver, or duplicate it. He just refuses."  
"From what you've told me, Jade has him practically wrapped around her finger. If he's not doing it, it'do probably because she doesn't want him to."  
"You know, you're right."  
"I often am. Hmm... Where does John keep his arms?"  
"In a chest in the barn, why?"  
"Dave probably wanted to go see it, just so he could have less of a disadvantage here. They might be there right now."  
"We should check, and get them back soon. It looks like it's going to rain soon." The last part was added as the inventor looked out the window. Jade was about to say something, but John and Dave silenced her quickly.  
"What?" She hissed furiously.  
"Bec is waterproof. We can have him tail them and use his recording function to possibly learn what the fuck was happening in that study."  
"What _didn't_ you put in that dog?" Dave asked. "You don't have to answer that." He added as John inhaled to list off exactly what Bec could not do. Jade put the robot dog down, and it scampered off after the adults, who had left during the argument.  
"Alright, let's play your game." Jade said. "But why don't we just, oh I don't know, _ask what was going on?_ "  
"Oh, like they'd tell us." Dave scoffed. "Adults think kids are too stupid to understand what they're doing, even though we do pretty much exactly the same things, but impaired by their prejudice." All the kids stood, nodding.  
"Hey, Dave, do you wanna see the workshop?" John asked suddenly.  
"Yeah, sure. Why not?" Dave rolled his eyes.  
"Great! Come on!" John took off down the hall, leaving Jade to drag the sputtering Dave behind her.  
**John: Prepare workshop**  
"You said yourself that you're going to be related to us someday. In order for that to work out for you, you're going to have to learn to deal with robots."  
"Does that kid not understand sarcasm?"  
**Jade and Dave: View**


End file.
